Agenda item

1.30 pm

The report presents a 6 month update on progress made on the implementation of recommendations from the Education Scrutiny Committee's deep dive into school exclusions.

The Education Scrutiny is RECOMMENDED to note the report for discussion.

The Scrutiny Committee had before them a report which provided an update on the progress on the implementation of recommendations from the Education Scrutiny Committee’s deep dive into school exclusions.

Accordingly, Councillor Lorraine Lindsay Gale, Cabinet Member for Cultural Services and Education and Deborah Bell, Head of Learner Engagement to speak to the report and answer any questions the Committee may wish to ask.

In introducing the report, Councillor Lindsay-Gale explained that as a result of the review, a new Learner Engagement team was created as of 1 October 2018 in the Education service and a Head of Service, Deborah Bell, started at this time. The purpose of this new team was to focus exclusively on children missing education and exclusions was a significant aspect of the team’s interface with schools and partners.

Actions to meet the recommendations from the deep dive in relation to exclusions had started following its acceptance in July 2018 but it has had a more specific focus with the creation of the new team.

The report sets out against each of the 8 recommendations actions that had been implemented with completion dates.  Significant strides had been made in working in close collaboration with schools and partners across Oxfordshire to collectively reduce exclusions both permanent and fixed term.

There remained much work to be done in being able to meet these recommendations and the team was clearly focussed to securing all children having access to full time education.

The Committee welcomed the progress against the Review recommendations and made the following points were made during discussion:

Members requested that they be invited to the Oxfordshire Schools Inclusion Team Conference.

There was a need to ensure that all schools were engaged and attended the Headteachers Meetings.

The Committee welcomed the learning engagement strategy and the Oxfordshire behaviour pathway – where exclusion was genuinely the last resort. 

The Committee noted that schools not providing data on exclusions remained a challenge, but that the revised In-year protocol (designed to fairly distribute vulnerable children without a school place across schools and designed to manage move’ pupils at risk of exclusionshould go some way to addressing the problem.

Local authorities needed to take a more proactive approach in encouraging In-year access with a view to reducing primary school exclusions.  The Committee noted that the DfE would be providing a revision to the Statutory guidance on exclusions in September.

In relation to the Council taking steps to improve the timeliness of Education, Health and Care Plan assessments (recommendation 3) the Committee noted that that there had been a 26% reduction in fixed term exclusions for SEND and that the new lead on Exclusions was working on improving the number of plans produced in 20 weeks.

In relation to developing behavior strategy that promoted inclusion (recommendation 5), the Committee welcomed the creation of the DFuty Line for school staff to call when faced with behavioural challenges, seeking immediate help on a no names basis.

In relation to developing personal resilience of vulnerable pupils (recommendation 6) the Committee welcomed the 2 additional Mental Health teams but expressed some concern about these sitting in health and ensuring that the education side was being looked after.  Officers gave assurances that they would be reporting to joint committees.

Following debate, the Committee thanked the Cabinet Member for Education & Cultural Services for her report and AGREED to ask officers to notify the Committee of an appropriate time to look at the Exclusion data and to request a representative from Health to come and speak to the Committee.